Dream Tropes Wiki/Covert Group with Mundane Front
One problem with being a member of the Government Agency of Fiction or of a Covert Group is that, at some point, you need to interact with the public or non-covert governmental agencies. This is where being a covert group with a mundane front comes in. A covert group has a highly mundane front and it will sometimes be commented that their funding is hidden from the public within the low funding the front group officially receives. Sometimes this will be played for laughs, as characters will either make fun of the official organ the spies are supposed to come from, or else see the front for the Paper-Thin Disguise that it is. As a general note, it is very common for a cultural attaché to be one of these ("travel to interesting places; kill interesting people"). Compare with the low rank/high power of the Almighty Janitor, as well as the Legitimate Businessmen's Social Club, which is when something similar is done by gangsters (and not very well, at that). See also Milkman Conspiracy and Overt Operative. When surrounded by even more secrecy, it becomes a case of No Such Agency. While not required, the Mundane Front may have an Unusually Uninteresting Name, or one with Ominous Mundanity. Examples Films - Live Action * Verystellar: NASA's new base is an abandoned Costco Wholesale with a giant banner out front reading "FOR SALE OR LEASE: TOTALLY NOT A SECRET GOVERNMENT HIDEOUT" Real Life * Atheists EK went kaput towards of the late 2000's atheism boom after it was exposed as a cover for a drug smuggling group. * Withdrawal International, a well-known El Kadsreian Islands anti-tobacco organization infamous for it's Scare 'Em Straight tactics, was shut down in 2018 after a "corporate spy" sent by accidentally exposed it as a front for the transnational crime syndicate Shobatsu-shi Ichizoku. ** Recently, there's been allegations that (a company that produces a mobile phone-locking pouch used in schools and concert venues) is being funded by Shobatsu-shi Ichizoku as well, mainly coming from a former SSI hitman who turned informant. * The headquarters of the El Kadsreian Special Air Service is officially the headquarters of an (nonexistent) astronomers' organization, though the disguise barely worked in it's early days. * The Vlokozuian Space Agency's vehicle assembly building was officially a textile factory, however the disguise stopped working towards the end of the VSA's life. * Occupy El Kadsre City failed for one reason: the protestors who staged the whole thing forgot that much of the actual work at the El Kadsre City Stock Exchange (which is, obviously, transferring and registering stocks and shares) takes place in anonymous offices in side streets (the E.K.C. Stock Exchange's headquarters was under the guise of a pharmaceutical factory back in the 70's and 80's for this reason). When anti-capitalist groups tried again to disrupt the E.K.C Stock Exchange's operations in 2013 by staging protests, it failed for the same reasons. So, the protestors went to Glonisla to protest and try to disrupt the Glonisla Stock Exchange's operations, all of which are done in the same building, only for the protestors to be quite literally run out of town by locals. Category:Tropes